P. 111. (12)

"And with no less nobility of love"

Dr. Badham (Cambridge Essays for 1856, p. 272) would read "And with nobility no less of love;" very improperly, I believe.-Steevens compares, in p. 123, "From me, whose love was of that dignity," &c.

"I cannot help suspecting that Shakespeare wrote 'celerity." Walker's Crit. Exam. &c. vol. ii. p. 242.-Surely not.

So the quartos, 1604, &c.-The folio has "haue;" erroneously, as the next line proves yet Mr. Knight retains "have."

P. 113. (15)

"In the dead vast," &c.

"This is the line as it stands in the quarto, 1603; and if that edition had afforded us no other correction of a misprint in the other quartos and folios, its high value would, we think, have been established. Hitherto the reading has been, In the dead waist, &c.;' the word waist having been printed wast or waste in all the old copies subsequent to that of 1603." COLLIER,-who was not aware that the quarto of 1637 has "In the dead vast," &c.

į.c. melted, dissolved. So all the quartos.-The folio has "bestil'd;" which Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector alters to "bechill'd."-But compare a passage (which Mr. Singer pointed out to me) in Sylvester's Du Bartas,—A Dialogue, &c., p. 281, ed. 1641;

"Melt thee, distill thee, turne to wax or snow;

Make sad thy gesture, tune thy voyce to woe," &c.

Nor are examples of the word in the same sense wanting in modern writers: a passage of Claudian (De Sexto Cons. Hon. v. 345),

"liquefactaque fulgure cuspis

Canduit, et subitis fluxere vaporibus enses,"

is thus rendered by Addison,

"Swords by the lightning's subtle force distill'd,

P. 115. (17)

And the cold sheath with running metal fill'd."

Remarks on several Parts of Italy, &c. p. 208, ed. 1745.

"Let it be tenable in your silence still;"

So all the quartos.-The folio has "Let it bee treble in your silence still,” &c. ; a blunder which Caldecott retains (and Mr. Knight once retained),—as meaning "Let it impose a threefold obligation of silence"!

P. 116. (18) "The safety and the health of the whole state;" The quartos, 1604, &c. have "The safety and health of this whole state;" which Mr. Collier adopts, remarking that "safety' was often of old, as in this line, pronounced as a trisyllable."-The folio has "The sanctity and health of the weole State;" which is kept by Caldecott and Mr. Knight, though the word "sanctity" is evidently an error for "sanity," to which Hanmer altered it. Malone observes; "the editor [of the folio], finding the metre defective, in consequence of the article being omitted before 'health,' instead of supplying it, for safety' substituted a word of three syllables."

P. 116. (19) "As he in his particular act and place"

Here again we must have recourse to the quartos, 1604, &c.-The folio has "As he in his peculiar Sect and force:" "but," as Mr. Collier observes, "there is little doubt that it is a misreading."

666

"Dulls' occurs thirteen lines below. May not Shakespeare have written 'stale thy palm' ?" Walker's Crit. Exam, &c. vol. i. p. 306.

Dr. Badham (Cambridge Essays for 1856, p. 282) unaccountably objects to this word, and, as unaccountably, proposes to read "court-ape."

P. 117. (23)

"Are most select and generous, chief in that."

So Rowe (i.e. says Ritson, "the nobility of France are select and generous above all other nations, and chiefly in the point of apparel").—The quarto of 1603 has "Are of a most select and generall chiefe in that;" the other quartos have "Or [and Ar and Are] of a most select and generous, chiefe in that;" while the folio has "Are of a most select and generous cheff in that."-Steevens suggested "Select and generous, are most choice in that.” -Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector, indifferent about the metre, reads " Are of a most select and generous choice in that ;” which Mr. Collier now adopts, and, as usual, goes out of his way to accuse me of error: "the same blunder," he says, "of printing chiefe for 'choice' is committed, and undetected, in the comedy of 'The Widow' (Dyce's Beaumont and Fletcher, iv. 350), where the line

'The word of words, the precious chief, i' faith,'

is mere nonsense; the meaning being that of a 'precious choice word'." Now the passage of The Widow is this;

"Val. What's that, good, sweet sir?

First Suit. A thing that never fail'd me.

Val. Good sir, what?

First Suit. I heard our counsellor speak a word of comfortInvita voluntate; ha, that's he, wench,

The word of words, the precious CHIEF, i' faith !

Val. Invita voluntate! what's the meaning, sir?

First Suit. Nay, there I leave you; but assure you thus much,

I never heard him speak that word i' my life,

But the cause went on 's side, that I mark'd ever :"

and it seems almost incredible that Mr. Collier should seriously propose to alter "chief" to "choice." The First Suitor, in his ignorance, is evidently speaking of "invita voluntate" as facile princeps verborum.—Mr. Staunton prints, unmetrically, "Are of a most select and generous sheaf in that;" which he defends by two quotations from Ben Jonson.-Mr. Grant White gives "Are most select and generous in that."

The quartos, 1604, &c. have "Wrong it thus," which has been altered to "Wronging it thus," and to "Wringing it thus.”—The folio has "Roaming it thus," which Caldecott and Mr. Knight retain, and explain-to their own satisfaction. But that "Roaming" is a mistake for "Running," I have been long convinced. So in a line of King John,

the folio erroneously has ".

rome on?" (see note 33, vol. iv. p. 82).— Mr. Collier also, in his note on the present passage, proposed "Running,” before it was known that his Ms. Corrector had made the same alteration.

P. 118. (25) "Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter," Walker (Shakespeare's Versification, &c. p. 206) cites this line as containing an example of “daughter" used as a trisyllable.

66

So the quartos, 1604, &c.-The folio has "the eye;" which is retained by Caldecott and Mr. Knight: but, though our early writers talk of “an eye of green" (as in The Tempest, act ii. sc. 1), "an eye of red," an eye of blue," &c., do they ever use "eye" by itself to denote colour? "It is here," according to Mr. Knight, "metaphorically put for character."

So Theobald (and Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector).-The old eds. have "bonds."

P. 119. (28)

"slander any moment's leisure”

For "slander," — which is explained "disgrace," "abuse,”—Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector substitutes "squander."-Mr. Collier and Mr. Grant White

are mistaken in stating that all the old copies have "moment leisure :”— the quarto of 1611, now before me, reads as in my text.

The first quarto and the folio give (the former imperfectly) only the first four lines of the present speech.-The quartos, 1604, &c. have “By their ore-growth."

The quartos, 1604, &c. (see the preceding note) have "His."

P. 120. (31)

"the dram of evil

Doth all the noble substance oft debase
To his own scandal."

Only in the quartos, 1604, &c. (see note 29).—The quarto of 1604 has

"the dram of eale

Doth all the noble substance of a doubt
To his owne scandle."-

The undated quarto and that of 1611 have

Doth all the noble substance often dout [i.e. do out],

To his own scandal;"

which is adopted by Caldecott, Mr. Knight, and Mr. Collier, except that they substitute "ill" for "base." But, in the first place, "often" is very questionable, because, in all probability, "of" in the old copies is a mistake for "oft," and secondly, as Mr. W. N. Lettsom observes to me, "the words 'To his own scandal' are fatal to the reading 'dout' (i.e. do out); for if that alteration be right, they are superfluous. A verb," he adds, "I should think, must lurk under the corruption 'a doubt' or 'doubt,' with the signification of turn, pervert, corrupt, or the like. Shakespeare's meaning evidently is, that a little leaven leavens the whole lump,-that one vice will ruin an otherwise perfect character."-The Rev. W. R. Arrowsmith (in Shakespeare's Editors and Commentators, p. 6) cites the passage thus,

"the dram of base

Doth all the noble substance often draw

To his own scandal.”—

For the reading now inserted in the text I alone am answerable.

P. 120. (32)

"why the sepulchre, Wherein we saw thee quietly in-urn'd,”

In my Few Notes, &c. p. 137, I remarked; “Perhaps the reading of the quartos ‘quietly interr'd' is preferable, because 'in-urn'd' implies that the body had been reduced to ashes,"-a remark which I now wish to recall, Compare Coriolanus, act v. sc. 6;

"Bear from hence his body,

And mourn you for him :-let him be regarded

As the most noble corse that ever herald

Did follow to his urn."

(1865. A pleasing poet of our own day has

66 Perhaps they muse with a desponding sigh

On the cold vault that shall their bones inurn," &c. Bowles, Elegy, among Sonnets and other Poems, vol. i. p. 42.)

Here the folio has "It wafts you;" a little after, “It waues me;” and presently again," It wafts me;" and so Caldecott and Mr. Knight. But there can be no doubt that Shakespeare in these three places used the same form of the word; and as the quartos, 1604, &c., in all three have “waues," they surely are to be followed.

"Is wrong. Drive'?" Walker's Crit. Exam, &c. vol. iii. p. 262.

66

So all the old eds., except the imperfect quarto 1603, which has “ Confinde in flaming fire."-Heath conjectured to lasting fires;" and so reads Mr. Collier's Ms. Corrector.-In support of the old text the following passages have been cited. And moreover, the misese of helle shal be in defaute of mete and drink." Chaucer's Persones Tale, p. 291, ed. Tyrwhitt, 4to. "Whether it be a place of horror, stench, and darknes, where men see meat, but can get none, or are ever thirstie," &c. Nash's Pierce Penniless his Supplication to the Devil, sig. G, ed. 1595.

"Thou shalt lye in frost and fire

With sicknesse and hunger," &c.

At the conclusion of The Wyll of the Devyll, bl. 1. no date.

So quarto 1603.-The other old eds. have "stand an end.”—See note 120 on The Sec. Part of King Henry VI. vol. v. p. 217.

P. 123. (37)

"To ears of flesh and blood.-List, list, O, list!—"

So the quartos, 1604, &c.-The folio has "

list Hamlet, oh list," which